Serenbe homes

Serenbe, Georgia

Over breakfast this morning, my eye caught an intriguing article in the New York Times, “Heads Up – Outside Atlanta, a Utopia Rises.” The article deals with an issue close to my heart, that of New Urbanism. Written by Kevin Sack, the piece traces the development of Serenbe, Georgia, a new development thirty miles outside the ever-consuming sprawling entity known as Atlanta, Georgia.

Serenbe, Georgia, initially started as a weekend retreat and place of solitude for acclaimed culinary couple Steve and Marie Nygren. In 1995, the Nygren’s purchased a 60-acre farm as a weekend retreat from the chaos of Atlanta. Soon their weekend retreat transformed into a vision for a sustainable community, founded on the following ten New Urbanism principles: walkability, connectivity, mixed use and diversity, mixed housing, quality architecture and urban design, traditional neighborhood structure, increased transportation, green design, sustainability and quality of life. The article briefly addresses the values of New Urbanism, choosing instead to focus more on the unique culinary heritage of Serenbe Community and the resulting impact on the community today.

New Urbanism, according to their website, offers the following definition:

Giving people many choices for living an urban lifestyle in sustainable, convenient and enjoyable places, while providing the solutions to peak oil, global warming, and climate change.

Notable communities founded on New Urban principles include Seaside, Florida; Celebration, Florida; and Kentlands, Maryland, among others.

Seaside, Florida

Seaside, Florida

For me, one of most interesting principles of New Urbanism is its commitment to mixed used and diversity. New Urban communities seek to blend demographic and social heterogeneity into their communities, and yet, when wealth is not equally distributed across demographic lines, diversity is difficult to achieve when the introductory prices of houses are $300,000 – $500,000, as is the case in Serenbe, Georgia.

So how should the tension between diversity and housing quality be addressed? Should New Urbanist communities continue to espouse the importance of mixed use and diversity as a principle, or sacrifice these components in order to create the idyllic community that results from high realty prices? In addition, why is diversity important if it continues to remain at the center of New Urbanism. While New Urban communities and designers propagate the importance of diverse communities, they offer limited reasons as to why diverse communities need to exist. Is ‘diversity’ just another buzzword used without justification? If we as a society and community value diverse communities (something I very much believe in), how can we best explain the rationale behind this intent to live in community with diverse others? In the following series, I will attempt to address these questions.